What's in a Name
by PoppyseedMuffiin
Summary: For Petrichor, there was never any in-between. He was either way outside of the box, or curled up inside it. He was either 'Serious Steve' or 'That One Wise Guy'. Everyone either wanted to be his best friend, or to beat him up. He either had his head in the clouds, or practically underground. And then there were the Names... Well. That's a whole other story. For today.


Name: Petrichor

Nickname(s): Petri, Falafel, Corey

Parents: Sulawesi, Howler

Sexuality: not sure yet

Backstory, sort of:

From the moment he hatched, Petrichor didn't need anybody else to tell him he was special. He _knew_ he was special, and there were a lot of reasons why.

It wasn't just that he knew both of his parents and they loved and cared for him, unlike most of the RainWing population, although that by itself was pretty special.

It wasn't just his flexible toes, small wings, curvy horns, extra-long tail, or winning personality, although some might say these particular traits generally did not make one special.

It was the Names.

All the dragonets Petrichor knew had one Name, two if they were lucky, and three if they were extra-lucky. Not Petrichor! He knew he was special, because he had so many _Names_. Sometimes he questioned if giving him so many Names was a good idea, because his parents tended to use the Other Names so much that it seemed they forgot what his original Name was. He made sure to remind them often so they didn't forget.

_Petrichor, Moma! _He'd remind his mother brightly, when she seemed to forget every morning. _My Name is Petrichor! P-E-T-R-I-C-H-O-R! I learned how to spell it in school!_

_You called me Petri the other day, Dada,_ he said to his father, when his father used the Other Names when picking him up from the wingery. _Why don't you use that Name instead?_

This method had good and bad side effects. On the good side, his parents didn't use an Other Name for a little bit after that, but it only tended to last a few minutes. On the bad side, the only reason they didn't use an Other Name was because his remindings confused them so much that they forgot how to use his Other Names. They'd smile and nod and pat his head, and scoop him up into their arms and hold him close.

_Yes, little chimp, we know your name is Petrichor. Do you know why we named you that? The Rain Kingdom was in a terrible drought the entire year you were just a little egg. There was barely any water! We all had to learn how to live like SandWings, and a lot of the plants shriveled up and died. But, on the day you hatched, we had rain! For the first time in almost a year! It was a miracle. It smelled of beautiful, life-giving rain when you crawled out of your egg, and we knew that was going to be your name. We looked up 'the smell of rain' on Google, and the Urban Dictionary told us that it was called, 'petrichor'. Which was lucky, because if it had been two words, your name would have been different entirely! We love you, little chimp, and your name saved the entire kingdom._

Which was all well and good, but Petrichor was still left confused after they told him the Name Story. (Everyone had one, more on that later) If they liked his Name so much, and it had so much meaning for them, why did they use the Other Names? It just didn't make sense.

He was proud of his Other Names, however, and made sure other dragonets knew it. Whenever he was pushed together with someone else for a playdate while his parents caught up with theirs, he always asked how many Names they had. After he had to explain to them what he meant (uncultured swine, did their parents teach them anything?) they almost always only had one or two. Petrichor had so many, he tended to lose count. There were a few Other Names that his parents favoured over the others, though, so he knew those Other Names were best.

Teachers favoured the Other Names too, sometimes more than his parents. By the time he was halfway through his first school year he was proud of his teachers; they had almost all of his Other Names down pat. Oddly, NightWings especially liked to use the Other Names-way more than RainWing teachers. He was pretty sure they didn't know his parents (he wasn't sure that they knew who _he_ was half of the time) and yet they still knew the Other Names. They didn't turn the colours of a beautiful sunset and got louder and louder instead of quieter, then louder when they used the Other Names like RainWings did, but they still knew them nonetheless. Interesting. He filed it away with everything he knew about Names.

Throughout his first year of existence, he learned a lot of things about Names. He began to categorise them, and was glad he did. Without him, no one would no about Names correctly, and then the world would be utter chaos. Names and money made the world go 'round was Petrichor's first Name Rule. They weren't rules, exactly, or commandments, but rather a set of observations and flowcharts mixed with rock-hard, solid facts that Petrichor knew about Names. All of this went into a very special bag, that he wore at all times, understandably dubbed the 'Name Bag'.

The basic idea went as follows:

_Names and money make the world go 'round._

_Everyone has a Name. No exceptions. Even if your parents didn't give you one, you had one for yourself. _

_To have a Name is to have an Identity, and to lose a Name is to lose your Identity. A Name is who you are._

_Everyone who was Named, whether by themselves or their parents, has a Name Story. It can be boring or exciting. If you were Named after your grandmother, that's a boring Name Story. If you were Named for an affinity for cliff diving, that's an interesting Name Story._

_It is possible to not have Other Names, although it is Uncommon. What is Uncommon is to have more or less than 1-3 Other Names._

_There are different types of Other Names. The most Common are Short Names. These are your regular Name, but shortened as a form of convenience or affection. The longer your Name, the more Short Names you are likely to have. Similar to - but not the same as - Pet Names. Pet Names can include your Short Name, but more often than not involve sickeningly sweet things as well. Couples have a lot of these for each other, as do parents for young dragonets. There are also Trouble Names. Trouble Names have many subspecies of different varieties. If you are a child and misbehave very badly, you might have yourself a Trouble Name, commonly bestowed by teachers and parents. Adult dragons often go seeking these kinds of names for themselves. There are many other kinds of Other Names, but the 3 most Common are Short Names, Pet Names, and Trouble Names._

_Names are fickle things. They belong to you, but are used by others. To have control over your Name is to have control of yourself. Others can use your Name against you, to try and make you feel less, but a Name can also be used to empower you and make you feel bigger. Names carry weight, and some collapse under it._

And on, and on it went.

Meanwhile, as Petrichor grew more and more informed about the elusive nature of Names, it rather seemed that his peers went in the opposite direction. As his first birthday came and went, he still explained the concept of Names and how his were special to every dragonet he met, but to his surprise, a small but growing number weren't as thrilled with it as they used to be. Some of them (a few repeat customers, as he knew almost everyone in the Rain Kingdom by now) simply labelled him as snobby and weird and told him to sod off. It was quite unexpected, but he in turn simply labelled them as jealous that their Names weren't as special, and sought refuge in the dragonets whose faces still glowed with envy, awe, and rapture when he told them about Names.

Once dragonets were more than a year old, they began to find their colours for themselves. They imitated patterns still, (when their scales didn't reflect their moods) but they started to choose the colours that they wanted to be when they were neutral. This was normal. However, Petrichor's parents were, surprisingly, upset when he chose a large part of his scales to reflect the beautiful sunset colours and loud voices that so often accompanied his Other Names.

_The blue and green and even the yellow spots are okay, Petrichor,_ they told him, _but are you sure you want to have all that orange and red? It clashes horribly._

_Yes, Moma. Yes, Dada. I'm sure. It matches my Names._

Which only rewarded him with those confused stares, followed by the smiles and nods and Name Stories. He didn't get any Other Names that day.

However, a day was fast approaching that would change Petrichor's life forever. When a dragon was around two years old, they were taken before the queen to introduce themselves. It was a very new policy, to have the dragonets introduce themselves, or to even have them meet the queen. Before, they had only minded the eggs, and then just barely. However, Queen Glory and then her daughter, Queen Firefly, had insisted on getting to know the dragonets after the eggs hatched. Their advisors had been shocked. _Isn't it enough to just know who the egg's parents are? There are so many eggs to be organised, and more arrive every day. It's not our job to worry about them after they hatch,_ they had said. But the queens had insisted. _These are the RainWings of the future! I want to know my subjects through all the stages of life!_ the new policies were put in place.

The parents would take their dragonet(s) before the queen, and then the dragonet would show off their chosen colours, and tell the queen their Name(s). It was a moment of pride for everyone: the parents, the queen, and the dragonet themselves. A lot of time was spent making sure the dragonet was at their best before they met the queen. Afterward, life just continued as normal, but the queen made sure to know all her subjects by name.

Petrichor was a bit aflutter about this, however. What Name was he supposed to use? He would have rathered that his parents introduce him, because surely they would know the right Name to use for the queen. He had so many, how was he supposed to choose himself? He asked his parents one night, a few weeks before he was supposed to go before Queen Firefly.

_Moma, Dada, what Name do I use? What Name is right for the queen?_

As usual, they gave him their funny looks, but were used to it by now. They pulled him close, hugging him with their wings.

_You'll be fine. You know what your name is. You know what Name is right for you. You'll know when the time comes. Don't worry about it._

He _didn't_, though, that was the problem! For the next few weeks, he was a mess. His teachers and parents noticed, though, and the steady stream of Other Names kept flowing towards him. But, instead of sticking in his brain and being filed away for later logging in the Name Bag, they went right through his ears and out into the unknown. He agonized what Name to use, every minute of every day. He worried in the wingery, fretted at the fruit platform, and stressed at suntime. He lay awake at night, Names swirling through his mind and drowning him in their voices. He finally narrowed it down to three of his favourite Other Names, the ones that were his teachers' and parents' favourite Other Names as well. They _must_ be, they used them so much. Eventually, he settled on one that he had been hearing the longest, since the day he hatched. To tell the Truth, he more often than not mixed it up with his Original Name. It was perfect. He was ready.

Finally, the momentous day came. Petrichor's parents woke him up early, and the preparation began. Petrichor was given a bath so he was squeaky-clean, then was scrubbed with his mother's special scale polish until his scales gleamed. He was so excited, he almost forgot his Name Bag as they scrambled out the door, nearly late. He flew part of the way, but soon his too-small wings were tired and his parents carried him the rest of the way to the queen's 'palace'. It was a large treehouse that had been added on to over the years, so it had new rooms and corridors sticking out of it at all angles, nearly poking above the treetops. It was nearly entirely obscured by a dense explosion of hanging foliage, with berries and flowers and vines over every inch of it.

Petrichor's parents pushed through the vines, and entered the doorway. Inside, it was a large, bright, airy space, with patches of golden sunlight shining through the thick vines and light leaves onto the springy, woven, mossy ground. In the centre, there was a huge thick tree coming through the floor and going up to the ceiling, some of its lower branches making up the roof. The inside of the massive trunk was neatly hollowed out into a comfortable-looking, elegant throne. On it lounged a beautiful dragon. She was young, lean, and had the air of a lazy jaguar. Her scales were mostly dark shades, like black, navy, and indigo, but here and there shimmering patches of gold, lavender, and bright blue gleamed. She had a couple of gold loops on her tail and horns, and a little crown of flowers adorned her ruff. Some of Petrichor's teachers looked older than she was, but she radiated authority, and was not to be messed with. Around her, advisors and other members of the royal court scurried about, but none were actually interacting with the queen. His parents were informed by a small, light green RainWing that the queen had cancelled all petitions that day just so she could meet him.

Petrichor was in awe. This divine goddess of a dragoness wanted to personally know _him?_ He desperately hoped that the Other Name he'd chosen to use was the Right Name, and wouldn't turn out to be a Trouble Name.

As they drew closer, within ten feet of the queen, both his parents bowed low, nearly scraping the ground. He hastily followed suit.

"You needn't do all that! Get up, get up, so I can see your faces." the queen's voice, like a silver bell, rang through the room. She had sat up herself, and was looking at them expectantly with glowing eyes. She looked genuinely excited to meet him and his parents.

"And who are the proud parents of this very handsome dragonet?"

"I'm Sulawesi-" his Moma began.

"-And I'm Howler." His Dada finished. "We're very pleased to finally meet you, my Queen."

"I'm very pleased to meet you, too! I've heard a lot about you," Queen Firefly said, smiling kindly and holding out a talon to shake. Out of instinct, Petrichor stepped forward and shook it, then froze in horror. Had he just made a terrible social faux pas?

His parents stared at him in horror too, hints of green showing under their perfectly buffed scales, but Queen Firefly grinned at him, squeezed his talon tightly, and shook it back.

"Aha, this must be the lovely dragonet I've been waiting to meet! You're very bold, and that's a good quality to have! How are your studies going?"

Petrichor managed to unfreeze and smile back. He puffed out his chest proudly, and only turned a little bit indigo with pride.

"Really good, Queen Firefly! I like school a lot!" this was sort of only half a truth. He did like school, and making friends, but not when the teachers used Other Names on the other dragonets. Those were _his_ Names, why did _they _get to use them?

"Cool! Keep it up! Your teachers say that you're very creative."

They were suddenly interrupted by a shout.

"_Mommmmaaaaaa! _Sterling's trying to eat all my fruit again! Tell her she can't have it!"

A very young dragonet, maybe not even a year old, skidded into the room, slipping on the bouncy moss. She ran over to Queen Firefly at top speed, and stumbled to a stop.

"It's _my_ fruit! She can get her own!"

"Poppy, honey, please. Momma's dealing with other things right now. Where's your Daddy, hm?"

"I dunno! He started _talking _again!"

Queen Firefly sighed, chuckled, and shook her head.

"That silly dragon. Leaving Sterling alone with you and your food."

The dragonet, (Poppy?) noticed Petrichor all of a sudden. She bounced over to him.

"Wow, your horns are _cool!_ Mine are all straight and poke out, but yours look like they were just stuck on the wrong way!"

"_Poppyseed! _I'm in the middle of meeting this _very polite _dragonet right now! I'm sorry, but if you don't have anything else to tell me, please go to the kitchens and get yourself some more fruit, there's plenty for everyone. And apologize to him for being rude."

The dragonet looked back at him, her face drooping in earnest. He noticed three strange things about her: One, she had _fur. _ Fur like scavengers had - growing out of her head, curling between her horns and cascading down her neck in a red, curly mass, and a curly tuft on her tail, too. Oddly enough, her wings also seemed to have feathers that changed into membrane.

Two, she only changed colour partway. She had a lot of stripes, especially on her tail and legs, but the rest of her scales were a dark grey, covered with tiny flecks and freckles of light tan and gold. The stripes and her wings seemed to be the only part of her that changed colour.

Three, her eyes were very strange. Not only were they blue, and not green or purple like most RainWings, they were two different colours. One was light blue, and the other was dark blue.

She had some other notable features, like the fact that she seemed to have lost her ruff and her horns were indeed straight and not curvy, but he didn't really notice them. He was almost hypnotised by her swirling, glowing eyes. He felt rather dizzy and loopy.

"I'm very sorry for being rude." she said honestly, breaking eye contact, and the dizzy feeling went away. "I didn't mean to make you feel bad about your horns. They really are cool. Can I stay and watch? Please? I'll be good!" this last part was directed at her mother, who was apparently the queen. He had forgotten the queen had a daughter already, she was still so young. He wondered who the young princesses' father was. The queen thought for a second, then nodded. She glanced sternly at her daughter.

"You can stay, but be quiet as a little mouse, like we practiced. Got it?"

"Yep!" Poppy said excitedly, parking herself next to the throne and puffing out her cheeks so she had a 'bubble in her mouth'. Petrichor remembered having to do that himself, back when he was her age. Not that he was much older than she was, but they at least didn't have do mouth bubbles anymore.

"So," the queen began, turning back to Petrichor. "Where were we, before we were interrupted by my easily excitable daughter?"

Poppy's eyes narrowed, and her stripes turned green and orange, but she kept her mouth shut.

"I was introducing myself," Petrichor reminded her.

"Ah, yes. What's your name, then? Forgive my rudeness, I forgot to ask earlier."

_This was the time! This was his moment! Everyone was looking at him expectantly, especially the queen. He took a deep breath…._

"Cut-It-Out-Petrichor!"

He knew instantly that something was wrong. Everyone had gone dead silent. Every single face in the court was turned towards him, and they all had the Look of confusion. He tried to break the silence.

"Is that the wrong one? I have more names! Stop-Doing-That-Petrichor? Sit-Down-Petrichor? Leave-That-Alone-Petrichor is one of my parent's favourites!" he finished desperately.

He saw Queen Firefly's puzzled gaze slowly slide from him to his parents. The colour had drained from all their scales, and they had turned a Trouble White. (There were two kinds of white, Regular White and Trouble White. Regular White was the colour RainWings turned when they were in pain. Petrichor saw Regular White when the healers treated RainWings with broken tails, busted heads, or exes. Trouble White was the kind of white that, as its name might suggest, let you know when you screwed up. Petrichor had seen Trouble White when one of his classmates had been called up in front of the entire class by their NightWing teacher, and then yelled at for getting an F.)

The silence was broken by a high-pitched sound that, again, sort of reminded Petrichor of little bells. He saw the the sound was Poppy, curled up next to the throne in the throes of a mad laughing fit. She was shaking and wheezing, she was laughing so hard, and her stripes were a glaring yellow and pink. Queen Firefly's head snapped toward her.

"_Princess Poppyseed Channary! _Go to your room _this instant!_"

_There's a Trouble Name if I ever saw one, _Petrichor thought. _A Full Name means business._

Poppy lifted her head up, laughing-so-hard-I'm-crying tears in her eyes. She saw her mother's expression and was instantly repentant.

"But _Momma_-"

"_**Now.**_"

Poppy got up, mouthed, _I'm sorry _to Petrichor and scuttled out of the room. Even though he knew it was the wrong time, he was rather regretful that he hadn't gotten to ask her about her Names.

There was once again awkward silence before Queen Firefly pinned his parents with an intense stare.

"So, I hope you can see how it's a little bit disconcerting that you've said these things so much to this dragonet that he thinks they're his name."

..Well. Petrichor wasn't allowed to introduce himself for a while after that. His parents were called back for several conferences with the queen and his teachers, and although they weren't punished, they were also bewildered that they had misunderstood their own son so fabulously. He explained to them the concept of Names, and showed them his Name Bag, and eventually they finally understood why he was always calling them out for their 'Other Names'.

After a lot of therapists, for both him and his parents, they discovered that he had ADD, and he really couldn't help it. He also had a bit of mild obsessive-compulsive disorder, but that really only showed itself in his obsession with Names, and didn't really affect him other than that. His parents, however, got better at doing their job. Now that they knew from whence Petrichor's strangeness hailed, they could deal with it better, and he got medicine for it too.

He never had any Other Names again, besides the Short Names. There was also one rather eventful incident in Biology I class that landed him with the unfortunate moniker 'Petri Dish', but that only lasted until school was out. Other than that, his Other Names all but disappeared. The Name Bag no longer went everywhere with him, and was retired to the back corner of his closet.

He began to earn a reputation, as the 'Smooth Talker', 'Trickster', and 'Wise Guy', but those weren't the same as Other Names. They were Labels, a new category of Name that Petrichor discovered after he was only three days into primary school.

He did, however, get to know Poppy, and after having some classes together, they hung out all the time. They got closer and closer, never as lovers, but as friends. Poppy, not to mention that sassy SandWing, Mocha or Coyote or whatever her Name was (more on her later) began to feel like his other two-thirds, and the three of them were inseparable. He got to know Queen Firefly, too, however, and Poppy's father, who he learned was a SandWing general called Pyrrhuloxia. Petrichor was simply around the palace so much with Poppy and Mocha that at first Pyrrhuloxia had thought he was a stalker, and confronted Petrichor in the corridor outside Poppy's room "dragon-to-dragon". Petrichor had nearly lost control of his bladder at the thought of being beaten up by the burly SandWing who was twice his size and rippling with muscles, but Poppy had come to his rescue and they explained that he was her friend. Queen Firefly called him 'a joy to have around' and said that he was welcome to come to the palace anytime, as long as he made sure that Poppy didn't start bringing home any _other _boys.

He knew what his other friends would think of him being friends with the princess, that they would call him a suck-up or a tail-kisser, so he tried to keep it quiet, especially without Poppy noticing that he was carefully measuring out and balancing the time he spent with her and Mocha versus his other friends.

However, all of his hard work was for naught after one of his teachers, in front of the entire class, promised to let him off the hook for forgetting his homework if he would maybe let it slip a little to the queen how good said teacher was at his job. Everyone in the classroom turned to stare at him, and he was thankful that his scales didn't change colour easily, and he thought that he might melt into a puddle and sink through the floor. The only good thing about that entire ordeal was that Poppy wasn't in his particular class in which it happened.

Petrichor thought that that was one of the most embarrassing moments in his entire life, right up there with introducing himself as 'Cut-It-Out-Petrichor' to the Queen of the RainWings. However, if he had thought that that was the most embarrassing thing that would happen to him in his school years, he was wrong. So very, very, very wrong.

**If you liked it, make sure to stay tuned for the next chapter of Petrichor's story! I wasn't really planning for this to be a story, it was just his backstory, but then i kind of ran away with it, lol**

**Also, his ref will be done soon, so be sure to check that out on my deviantart! Thanks, and please R&R!**

**~Cly, OUT!**


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